everything is happening at once, but nothing’s happening at all
In one of my last posts, I spoke about my freelance life balancing my new-found career linchpin – teaching – with my ‘traditional’ career fields – editing, proofreading, and translating.
Lately, it feels like everything is happening at once: Suddenly, I’m teaching an adult literacy class for speakers of other languages and other scripts than German and Latin, respectively. This has been taking up much of my time and energy, yet is extremely rewarding.
At the same time, it feels like nothing much has been happening apart from this. Why is that? I am still working for clients next to teaching, so there’s been no reduction there. I guess the real thing that’s changed is my personal output of lettered work. Apparently, finishing an actual piece of (art)work gives me a whole different sense of acheivement than working on manuscripts does, or even with people.

appearance versus reality
Having something to show for your work counts for a lot in this world. If people see a design you’ve worked on, or a layout you’ve optimized, they understand the work that went into it and appreciate it. However, it’s been my experience that what I like to call ‘invisible’ work – i.e. editing, proofreading, or teaching even – is not really appreciated in our society. Why? Because those who don’t do it simply don’t know how much work really goes into it.
Now, I’ve been working in the fields of ‘invisible’ work basically since I entered the job-world after having left university. And it never used to bother me. But now, after having found the ‘visible’ craft of hand-lettering, working predominantly in these fields feels different, somehow. Teaching, helping people get by in this world is extremely rewarding, and it makes me feel good. It has a different quality to it than finishing a lettering piece. And yet: solely focusing on one has made me realize that I miss the other.

deadline shmeadline
There is so much pressure in this world to ‘contribute’. Everyone, in some way or another, expects you to contribute to society, to do your part – even if it’s cleaning up after others or waiting on them. (Two careers that are generally frowned upon, but we honestly couldn’t function without.) In the freelance world, this pressure isn’t put on you by your colleagues (because you don’t have any), but by your online community – and yourself. You are constantly reminded of others’ output and success. Of course this can lead to production stress.
But creative work produced under stress is rarely your best work – at least it rarely is for me. Don’t get me wrong, deadlines are great and can really be helpful when you’re wrestling with procrastination issues and imposter syndrome. (“Just do it already!”) But my best creative work has always been when the piece has had time to just sit there and be mulled over for a few days. Then you go back and fix some things, make some changes, come to terms with it being finished, and then, after lots of coffee and nail-biting, you let it go. Only then can you evolve as an artist.

timeout output
Output can only be successful at one’s own pace. What we think people’s expectations of our output are should never become invisible looming deadlines. That takes the fun out of it. To make your best work, you need to be allowed to concentrate on it. Even if it’s not a lot of time in a day, sometimes the mindset just isn’t right for creative work, and it takes you a week or maybe even two to get back to it. That might not be overly productive, but that’s how I retain my passion for it.
I truly admire artists whose output is regular and full-time. I guess I’m a part-time artist. But I am a full-time idealist. And if I can make the world a better place by focusing on something other than my personal creative output, then that’s what I’ll do.
So know this: when I work on something ‘visible’ and post-worthy, you’ll be sure to see it here first. And in the meantime, trust that I’m working on other awesome stuff, even if you don’t see it on the internet or can’t buy it.